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The Caliph
The Caliph is one of AI opponent that appears in Stronghold Crusader, Extreme and Stronghold Crusader 2. Appearance Not much is known about The Caliph's appearance aside from his bold hypnotic eyes, because he never shows his face. Just like other Arabian lords, he wears a purple kheffiyeh. He is shown to wield a silver dagger, which is thought to be a janbiyah, (although unknown) with a gold hilt. ''Stronghold Crusader 2'' The Caliph reappears in Stronghold Crusader 2 with a different voice actor and appearance. He looks perhaps a little older than in the first Stronghold Crusader (judging by his eye area). His face is now visible and the in-game Arabic lord model is replaced with his own model. He has not lost his love for cruelty, armies of flame bearing slaves, burning pitch and his distinctive rectangular castles with lots of high lookout towers. Personality The Caliph is a cruel and vindictive man, who always brings misery, both to his people, allies and his enemies. He does not hesitate to burn enemies along with his allies' property, so long as he is safe. He also cruel to his people, to the extent that he always uses gallows and other negative things to scare them, even burning his own castle if the enemies have advanced close to his keep. He is a short-tempered man that always get angry if something happens to anyone, ally or enemy. He always speaks with harsh intonations, and cruel sarcasm. He tends to refer the player as "infidel". As an ally, he is a very uncooperative person, who doesn't want to be ordered to attack, or giving help. He will only accept the order only if he has a very large army. Castles and Strategies Economy The Caliph runs an all-round economy. He gathers most raw materials, placing numerous woodcutters, 2 quarries, a mine and many pitch rigs. He builds apple farms for the granary and produces hops for ale. He sacrifices morale to boost production to maximum efficiency by negative fear factor. The Caliph utilizes taxes to an extent and is not stingy with giving extra rations. Offense When attacking, he uses a lot Arabian bowmen and swordsmen. As he gets stronger, his attacks often consist of many horse archers and some ballistae. He is quite aggressive, which makes him a threat at the start of a game. However, as the player's defense mounts, his attacks become less and less effective. Slaves may come to fill in any moat, The Caliph is notable to harass the enemy from the very beginning by sending hordes of slaves.When he has the finances, the Caliph sends catapults and fire ballistae after one another to demolish any hostile buildings in sight. Defense He tends to build long, rectangular castles with a lot of lookout towers on the walls. He is good in defending: pitch ditches surround his outer walls and Arabian bowmen are stationed in his towers who will ignite with the slightest provocation. Fire Ballistae are placed near his outer walls. Like the other Arabian lords, the only European units he uses are engineers. He also uses oil smelters, to create large amounts of fire when attacked. His castle holds most of his buildings, so that there are no exposed buildings, except for his farms, woodcutter's huts and mines. This is mainly because the outer walls have pitch ditch to burn enemies. Inside the castle, he also places pitch ditches in case the enemy has broken through his walls. When he has the space, as well as his main wall, the Caliph also builds an outer low wall. This is to provide additional defence while the lowness of the wall allows his defensive fire ballistae to still be effective. How To Deal With Defense The Caliph brings a variety of units, but nowhere enough of them. This makes his forces rather ineffective in a siege. He brings Arab bowmen, Arabian swordsmen, horse archers and slaves, along with some engineers, who construct fire ballistae. Most of the time, horse archers (vulnerable as they are immobile unike Saladin's ones) and bowmen will fall from a few arrows, but the presence of Arabian swordsmen requires either crossbowmen or heavy infantry. Hostile fire ballistae can be destroyed with knights or macemen, as these can pick off a number of troops in a short time. Offense The best attack strategy would be to use trebuchets placed just close enough to his walls to smash them down, and tunneler's undermining his walls from below. A small wave of macemen should then rush ahead of the main attacking force (which should consist primarily of swordsmen and pikemen, and miscellaneous siege equipment) to ignite the pitch. After the walls have fallen, the heavily armored swordsmen and pikemen should be able to storm his keep without much difficulty. Quotes *On Skirmish **Enters game:'' "Infidel."'' **Leaves game: "Infidel!" *As player's ally **Requests goods: "I need goods. Send me the following!" **Recieves goods: "Your goods arrived.." **Giving goods: "I have sent your goods!" **Not giving goods: "You ask for the impossible!" **Requests help: "The sons of pigs have me surrounded. Send me your fastest men!" **Agrees to help: "Yet again, the Caliph must show you how to fight?!" **Refuses to help: "I will not waste my men on you." **Sieges an enemy: "Watch and learn, infidel!" **Agrees to attack: "Yes!" **Refuses to attack: "No! You will not command me as your servant!" **Kills an enemy lord: "Am I to dispose of all that foes? Well I expect nothing else!" **Congratulating: "So you can fight a little. Well, fight a little harder!" **Killed by enemy: "Death comes for me... I am not afraid... But maybe you should be." *As player's enemy **Attacks player: "My victory is at hand! The desert will run with blood, before this day is out!" **Failed to defeat player: "Argh! You test my patience! I will crush you yet!" **Destroys player's props: "Watch your back, knight! Watch your back." **Kills player's lord: "They will fall before me, as you will soon!" **Attacked by player: "Remove your army from sight of my castle walls, at once!" **Props get destroyed: "What! You dare to invade my lands?! You will pay dearly for this!" **Player's attack fails: "You are weak, infidel! My forces will ultimately bring you to your knees!" **Player's attack success: "Stay away from my lands, infidel! stay away!" **Killed by player: "You have not seen the last of me! Infidel!" Trivia *Strangely, in the sound files of Stronghold 2 there is a new voice for the Caliph with more Arabic accent that makes it possible that the Caliph was planned to appear in Stronghold 2. *Unlike other AI lords, a live actor is employed to represent Caliph rather than a pre-rendered animation. *The true identity of the Caliph is unknown. Navigation ru:Калиф Category:Characters